Karl Pfeffer-Wildenbruch

Karl Pfeffer-Wildenbruch (12 June 1888-29 January 1971) was an Obergruppenfuhrer of Nazi Germany's Waffen-SS during World War II who commanded the IX SS Mountain Corps in the Budapest Offensive.

Biography
Karl Pfeffer-Wildenbruch was born on 12 June 1888 in Kalkberge, Prussia, German Empire. He served on the general staff of Colmar von der Goltz in the Ottoman Empire, and in 1917 he returned to Germany to supervise the German 11th Infantry Division during World War I. In 1919, he joined the police of the Weimar Republic and from 1928 to 1933, he served as Chief of the Carabineros de Chile in South America. In May 1937, Pfeffer-Wildenbruch was promoted to Generalmajor der Polizei, and in March 1939 he joined the SS, rising to the rank of Brigadefuhrer in April. Pfeffer-Wildenbruch served in internal ministry roles in Nazi Germany during World war II, such as being Chief of Colonial Police from 1941 to 1943. In December 1944, he was given his first and only combat command, the IX SS Mountain Corps, which was stationed in Budapest at the time of the Budapest Offensive that same month. He was seriously wounded and captured by the Red Army during the breakout, and in 1949 he was sentenced to serve 25 years in labor camps; in September 1955 he was released after Chancellor Konrad Adenauer of West Germany and Premier Nikolai Bulganin agreed to the release of 10,000 German prisoners-of-war. Pfeffer-Wildenbruch died in a car crash in 1971.